


The Delights of Spring

by starsgazingback



Category: Mononoke-hime | Princess Mononoke
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, Flirting, One Shot, Post-Canon, Puppy Love, Short & Sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-05
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-18 07:02:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29854341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starsgazingback/pseuds/starsgazingback
Summary: super short post-canon Ashitaka/San story; they meet for a picnic every year
Relationships: Ashitaka/San (Mononoke-hime)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	The Delights of Spring

Their spring time picnics have become his favorite ritual. Without his people and their own annual celebrations, it was hard at first for the exiled prince to find joy in marking specific dates and seasons. But each spring, on the first truly glorious day, villagers would report to Lady Eboshi that the strange, foreign man they’ve all come to love and look to for wisdom had disappeared into the mountains with Yakkul. Ashitaka can’t always predict when San will call out to him, but as soon as the last of winter’s snows vanish and the earliest spring blooms fill the hills with color, as soon as the sun feels hot on the back of his neck again, it’s only a matter of guessing the hour. She doesn’t sing like a maiden in love or howl like a wolf at the hunt - but Ashitaka hears her all the same. And so the end of winter has become his favorite time of year.

This time he’s packed a feast for gods, with a hidden bottle he wants to savor only with her. He had to make many of the foods fresh each morning for a week in anticipation of San’s appearance, or else risk delaying their meeting or arriving empty-handed. Ashitaka had never been a great chef but he thinks he’s perfected some of these dishes over the last few days, if not through the years. His closest friends in Iron Town didn’t mind his obsession this spring, since they often got to dive into the wasted meals. Ashitaka leaves mid-morning, finally, when he knows in the way he always knows that San is close by. It’s a physical knowledge, but spiritual too.

He’s grateful to whatever gods remain that he can chase the feeling of her presence in a time of peace with bees buzzing lazy and heavy in the warm spring wind. He feels a little like a wolf himself, though he knows better than to tell her that. “San?” He knows she’s close enough to hear him but for some reason, she’s hiding. This worries him and, not for the first time, he wonders what new danger threatens their delicate equilibrium. The cool shadows of the ancient forest make his spine quiver for a moment and the old curse tingles in his palm.

“San? Is anything wrong?”

Then she steps out and raises herself to her full height, spear clutched against her hip, mask pulled up to reveal her painted face. “Hello, Ashitaka,” she greets him as she always does and he releases his tense shoulders.

-

“Why does she not run to him?” the smaller wolf asks the larger one. “When I have a mate, I will be too excited not to run!”

“San is shy,” answers the elder wolf. “And maybe the prince does not like to be rushed, even by his mate. Humans are very odd.”

They stretch legs one after the other, then bound away like glimmers of light into the heart of the forest. San is safe now with Ashitaka and the elder wolf has pups to look after.

-

San has learned a great lesson in patience watching Ashitaka prepare a meal. His movements are graceful and his hands, though strong, are careful and precise. He always thanks the gods and tidies up his cooking spot before dishing out the delights he’s brought to share. This is San’s favorite ritual. Despite her hunger, she’s content to watch and wait for his signal. Every year, their lunch has grown more elaborate and San can hear her brothers chiding her already: “How many chickens must he bring you before you will mate?” “Why do humans wait entire seasons in between meetings?” “We will grow three tails and become blind with age before you two have a litter!”

San is tired of arguing and has her replies ready, like every year: “The food he brings is not courtship. It’s friendly.” “We don’t always wait that long to visit each other, but he’s busy!” “You have your own pups and leave me out of it.”

Humans are funny, though. She can even admit now that some of them are gracious. Most don’t have Ashitaka’s noble heart and wise mind, but many, she’s learned, are generous and silly and patient - traits the wolves taught her to love. Still, she cannot forgive them when so many make decisions out of fear or hatred or greed, that the whole lot of them smell like treachery. Except Ashitaka; he smells like all the good things of the forest, clean and warm and still, plus he has animal smell, from Yakkul and from himself. San knows Ashitaka’s scent better than any other because it thrills her more than the smell of fresh meat or a clean river.

It was holding her eldest brother’s new pups which made her realize how much she wanted the prince from far away to stay longer than a day and sleep near her longer than one night’s need for healing. Her nieces and nephews loved their odd aunt on two legs but they were not her own. Someday, San feared, there would be wolves in this mountain who did not know her or love her… Perhaps she would be dead by then.

“San?” Ashitaka’s voice is worried again, when he notices she hasn’t touched a morsel. That’s very unlike her. He’s watched an entire bowl of stew vanish into her gullet in a matter of seconds, before she asked for more. “What’s on your mind?”

He wonders if she also feels this closeness, as if they’re connected by a thread of spider silk, or this warmth that gathers below his stomach and spreads up to his face, or the need he often feels, like the urge to run down a steep hillside or the pleasure of skipping a stone over the smooth surface of a lake, to stop whatever he’s doing and find her. Does she feel these things too? Do they trouble her? Is she afraid? Angry?

“Ashitaka,” she mumbles and quizzically tilts her head. “Is Iron Town rebuilt?”

“Hm? Well, yes, I’d say so. We’ve built it stronger and -” he pauses, apprehensive, “They’ve honored their word, haven’t they, not to violate the forest?”

San simply nods. “Then, you’re finished working there? You said you wanted to help the humans rebuild the town. You’ve done so, yes?”

“Yes…”

“Good.” This appears to satisfy her and she turns to the food with renewed interest. San loves to hunt but even she can’t deny the pleasure of human cooking. They have spices and broths and techniques she can only dream of, and Ashitaka must be a master of the craft.

For his part, he lets San believe the meager picnics he brings her are the height of human achievement…for now. Someday, he’d like to take her to a festival and show her the best foods, and the music and the artisans. It surprises him (and scares him a little) how easily he can imagine her strolling through a town like she belongs there.

She walks with the confidence of a general and the grace and dignity of a wolf; no one would mistake her for a princess, but strangers might call her a goddess. His goddess is licking the inside of her bowl. He laughs without meaning to. “Here, there’s more.”

This is how they spend their favorite day of each new year, though it can’t be marked on a calendar. They live by the sense of each other and tell the passage of time by the phases of the moon and the changing seasons.

San stretches after a good meal like that and wiggles into the grass. Ashitaka lays down beside her and they sleep in the sun. After the hottest part of the day, San wakes and rolls closer to Ashitaka, breathing his scent in deeply. He will wake soon and politely take his leave. She will be curt but polite, always a little stung that he prefers to sleep behind a wall with hundreds of other humans in a city resembling a rat pit, than with her in a warm, quiet cave or out in the open under the stars. He will leave, as he always leaves, unless she can stop him.

Ashitaka sleeps longer than he means to and Yakkul finally nudges him awake. The man groans to taste elk-breath where he would prefer someone else’s kiss to rouse him. He playfully swats the elk away, “Alright, I’m up.”

“If you leave now, you will miss the sunset.” San has packed all his things and tidied up their picnic spot. She’s never done that before. “Come follow me and you’ll see.” She’s never invited him to stay longer than the day either.

Suddenly, Ashitaka feels tongue-tied and clumsy. He chases after her a little too eagerly and San smirks. Yakul blinks, huffs a sigh, and climbs uphill after them carrying their goods.

Neither has much to say about the sunset. It’s an explosion of pinks and purples and reds that promises an equally beautiful day come sunrise. Lovely. They’re both too busy focused on not upsetting the other.

If San reaches out to lick and bite his ear, will Ashitaka know what it means? If he holds her hand any tighter, she might take it for a threat so he forces himself to relax… If he tries to kiss her, will she kill him? They’re both paralyzed.

Something shiny at her neck catches his attention and Ashitaka silently prays in thanks for the relief that he found something to talk about. “You still have the crystal dagger I gave you…”

“Yes,” she touches it, “it’s beautiful and very strong.”

Some bravery he doesn’t feel guides his fingers toward it… Their fingertips brush together and Ashitaka’s wind their way behind her neck. “More beautiful and strong because of who wears it.”

Neither is sure who kissed who but Yakkul looks away and they don’t make it all the way to her cave. Later, naked and tired and, yes, somehow hungry, San stretches and curls into her mate’s side. “I’m glad you didn’t leave again.” It sounds like a silly thing to say, but she felt it deserved saying.

“Me too.”

They sleep beneath the stars, unafraid and ready for the delights of spring.


End file.
